


Tell Me About The Dream

by theandrogynousdragon



Category: Humans (TV)
Genre: AU for all of season 2, AU for the last episode of season 1 as well, Aftermath of Torture, Amnesia, Angst, Angst and Feels, Bisexual Male Character, Boys Kissing, Canon-Typical Violence, Dubious Consent Due To Identity Issues, F/M, Fred Lives, Headaches & Migraines, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Internalized Homophobia, Leo has a crisis, M/M, Mad Science, Multi, Polyamory Negotiations, Smoking, Swearing, Ten Lives, and dies in the first few minutes?, because Hobb, because hester, bi panic, david elster was not a good parent, eventually lol, i am not nice to poor leo in this one oof, i'm mostly just implying certain events from canon rather than following any of canon at this point, it's more likely than you'd think, leo has to get stabbed first apparently, me? getting unreasonably attached to a character, not graphic tho, now apply that to cyborgs, what happens when you run a strong magnet over a laptop?, who only appears in one episode, your honor i simply do not vibe with canon
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-24
Updated: 2020-12-21
Packaged: 2021-03-08 04:02:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,953
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26999374
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theandrogynousdragon/pseuds/theandrogynousdragon
Summary: "Your name," he writes, carefully. "Is Leo Elster."
Relationships: Anita | Mia & Leo Elster, Leo Elster & Fred, Leo Elster & Max, Leo Elster & Niska, Leo Elster/Mattie Hawkins, Leo Elster/Mattie Hawkins/Ten, Leo Elster/Ten, Niska/Astrid Schaeffer
Comments: 4
Kudos: 12





	1. Error_02: file not found

He wakes up and doesn't know where he is. The scientist... His head _hurts_. Someone said that might happen. _When? And who was it?_ It's so bright here. White walls, white door, white lights that _burn_. His eyes sting badly. There are no windows here, except for the little strip of glass set into the door. The door is heavy steel. He doesn't know how he knows that. _No matter how many times you try, you won't be able to force it open. The glass is too thick to break by hitting it._ His hands are cuffed to a steel bar just above the bench he's sitting on. He tugs at them ineffectually. He wonders if he's tried any of that before. He doesn't remember. But his wrists and knuckles are bruised and cut all over, so maybe he has?

* * *

The door slams open and he recoils instinctively. There are words behind his teeth, but he doesn't dare say them. I'll be good, I promise, just don't... don't _what_? Something. It hurt, anyway. A blond woman with _bright, so bright, that's not_ _ **natural**_ green eyes rushes in, grabbing at his hands, and he flinches hard, moving back as much as the restraints will allow.

“Hey,” the woman says, eyes gone soft and worried. “It's alright, Leo, it's just me.”

He doesn't know who she is, or who “Leo” is. Is he Leo? He must be, if she called him that. His head _**hurts**_. “M'sorry,” he rasps. His mouth is numb.

The woman quietly unlocks the cuffs and helps him to his feet, pressing a bundle of clothes into his chest. “Get changed, quickly. I don't want to be here any longer than I have to.” He turns and slides the smock off his shoulders and the woman hisses. She carefully traces the outline of a burn on his back. He realizes, with a start, that he has quite a few of those little circular burns, and an open wound in his side. The pain is distant, mercifully. “What happened?” the woman bites out.

“Cattle prod,” he mumbles. He doesn't know how he knows that, either. He fumbles into the clothes the woman brought with clumsy fingers as she mutters about “should kill that damn doctor”. He decides not to ask. His head _hurts_ , a throbbing ache he can feel in his teeth, and it only gets worse once they get outside. There are other people outside, gathered around a van, and Possibly Leo pulls up short, trying to decide if he should run or not. (But where would he go?)

One of the women, with straight blue-black hair and olive skin and _green green green_ eyes turns and starts toward him. Probably Leo shudders, stumbling a step back, torn between wanting to run and wanting to get as far away from the scientist as possible. The blond woman taps his shoulder lightly, whispering, “easy now. C'mon, we have to go.”

* * *

Maybe Leo climbs into the van and curls up small as he can make himself. He drifts into a light doze, scraps of conversation filtering through ears that feel packed with cotton.

“alright?”

“must have dosed him with”

“clear up?”

“don't know”

Then someone taps his shoulder and he wakes with a start, staring at a dark-skinned man with the same _too bright_ green eyes as the others. “We're here,” the man says softly, a smile tugging at his mouth. Perhaps Leo staggers out of the van into someone's front yard. There's a pink-yellow child's bike sitting on the curb. He toes it onto the yard, gently. He doesn't want anyone tripping over the thing.

* * *

The people in the house are, startlingly, confusingly, human. (Are the others... _not_ human, then?) They look almost washed out next to the... what are they called? Green-eyes, anyway. They are _loud_ , though, especially the littlest one, and he grimaces when his ears start ringing. The older woman with red hair and pale eyes—he hears one of the green-eyes call her Laura—ushers them inside and the girl with brown hair and dramatic eye makeup bumps his shoulder, smiling at him a little oddly. “Alright, charm school?” she says, and he's completely lost.

He decides to stick to what he knows and ask someone what the hell is going on later. (There will always be a later, always an excuse to keep those words trapped in his throat, but he doesn't know that yet.) “Well, considering there was a _mad scientist_ and all, I've been better.”

* * *

Dramatic Makeup Girl's smile turns into a proper grin, so he must've said _something_ right.

* * *

By the end of the night, he's figured out everyone's names and been aggressively patched up by blonde-green-eyes-Niska, who is apparently not actually mad at _him_. So she says, anyway. Undecided Leo decides people are weird and messy and confusing and slips out the door the first chance he gets. He climbs up onto the roof easily enough, even though it pulls at the wound in his side and his left leg burns like it's been lit on fire from the knee down. Fun. Maybe he can ask Mia about that later? Discreetly? She might make a fuss though. Fred seems like a steady sort; he'll talk to him about it in the morning.

* * *

He tugs a pack of cigs out of his coat pocket, and finds that for this, at least, there is a sense of familiarity. It's almost funny, in a morbid sort of way. The only thing he remembers is fucking _smoking_. A window opens below him and he startles, moving back a bit as Dramatic Makeup Girl—Mattie, according to her mum sniping at her about something earlier—swings up onto the roof with a bag of something he can't quite see in the dark. She wrinkles her nose, “menthols? Really?”

He makes a guess and mutters, “says the person hiding up here with a halfer of funny lettuce.”

“Oi, _I'm_ not the one chain-smoking, Mister High-And-Mighty.”

“Fair enough.”

“...do you _want_ one?”

“Pass, thanks.” He waits for her to get properly buzzed before asking, “hey, do you have a notebook I can have? Wanna write something down.”

She squints at him, a laugh bubbling out of her throat. It sounds nice. “What for? Thought you couldn't forget anything.” Ah. Well, _fuck_.

“Max said I should practice my handwriting, and I hardly use it anyway, so. Thought I might try making it less of an unholy mess.”

Mattie snorts, “good luck with that, it's bloody awful.”

“Thanks _ever_ so much.”

“I'll get you one, sure. Come with me?” She pockets the last half of her joint and does a funny little hop-walk down the roof to get to her window. He follows, rolling his feet heel-to-toe as he goes (it feels practiced, but he doesn't know where he would've learned to walk on precarious shingle roofs). Her room is warm, and very soft looking. The baseboards are a very peculiar color that he can't put his finger on and she looks at him funny when he asks her. She tells him it's just brown, but it doesn't look that way to him. He shrugs and drops it. No need to get all fussed over colours.

* * *

The notebook she hands him is horrendously, eye-wateringly pink-orange, with gross lemon-yellow-green plastic stars appliquéd on. So much for not getting fussed over colours. “Seriously?”

Mattie just grins at him. “Well, it's not like anyone's going to think the thing is yours.”

Leo (?) sighs. “D'you have something else? This thing's giving me a headache just looking at it.”

“Oh, come on, it's not _that_ bad. Just because it's _girly_ -”

“No, Mattie, it is _literally_ making my head hurt.”

“Alright, fine.” She takes the Hell Book away and gives him a nice burgundy one instead. She also gives him a blue glitter gel pen, but he kind of likes it. “I think you need to get your eyes checked, charm school.”

He points at himself, one brow raised. “Legally dead, remember?” _What? How does he know that? (How did that_ _ **happen**_ _?)_

“MATTIE!” Laura's voice hollers from down the hall, causing him to jump out of his damn skin. “YOU HAD BETTER NOT BE SMOKING AGAIN, YOUNG LADY!”

“I'M _NOT_ , MUM! THAT WAS LEO!”

“Oi!” he feels a tiny bit betrayed. 

* * *

Later, once Laura is done chewing _both_ of them out for smoking _and_ for being on the roof, he opens the burgundy notebook. He writes carefully in his best print: your name is Leo Elster. You have four siblings. Your sisters' names are Mia (maternal, worrier) and Niska (temperamental, fiercely protective but will deny it). Your brothers are Fred (inquisitive, quiet) and Max (younger? kind, trusting). You are friends with the Hawkins family, Joe (father), Laura (mother), Mattie (eldest daughter), Toby (middle child), and Sophie (youngest daughter, likes Niska). Possible connection to Mia? Circumstances of acquaintance unclear. (Siblings are robots? Sort of? Research needed.)

* * *

He really hopes he won't forget again, but if he does, at least he's written the important bits down. 


	2. 01101100 01101111 01110110 01100101 00100000 01111001 01101111 01110101

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> tw for mention of past assault, which is not clear to the victim

The synth designated Model FAC-10, or Diez, or Ten as they've taken to calling him, is utterly _fascinating_ to Leo, for three reasons, only one of which is immediately apparent to him.

* * *

The first reason: Ten is different from most so-called “general use” synths. He runs cooler than the others, a necessary function in an underground mine. More efficient cooling systems means less malfunctions when the mines get deep enough to be a problem for regular synths. (Humans haven't done actual mine work beyond supervising synth miner teams in the last five years.)

Ten can only speak Spanish, for now. They tried downloading the language file directly, but that threw sparks, so he'll have to learn it the human way. Most synths have at least two “base” languages, but whoever programmed him probably never intended for him to leave that mine. (Ten is attempting to teach Leo Spanish, which is going about as well as you'd expect. Ten thinks his accent is hilarious, judging by the amount of laughing he does every time Leo tries to get his mouth around the newest phrase. At least Leo can't forget _new_ information, even if he still can't remember anything _before_ the cell in the mad scientist's warehouse.)

He seems naturally inquisitive, which surprises Leo. He'd expected there would be an adjustment period, some confusion, but Ten isn't like that. Ten just jumps straight into questions, mostly about what makes some words names and some not.

* * *

Leo is... _different_ , after what happened with Hobb. They've all noticed, but he's been distressingly tight-lipped about what happened. He doesn't drink anymore, but he smokes like it's 1925 and people haven't linked tobacco to lung cancer yet. He faces doorways when he sits down, glances to check windows and sight-lines and the number of people in a room as soon as he enters it. He barely talks, but he's not as surly in his quiet as before. He's more forthcoming when he gets hurt, which is good, at least. (Fred had been horrified to learn that Leo'd had _nerve damage_ that had been getting worse this whole time and he'd never said anything until now.) He _sings_ , now, little snatches of various tunes, and he hasn't done that since his mother died. (since he died and came back) Max thinks of clones, of synthetic copies, of acts of God, and he wonders. He thinks of trauma, too, and isn't certain.

* * *

No one knows of the Memory Book except for Ten, who found out entirely by accident, and Leo swore him to secrecy. (This, unfortunately, doesn't work as well as Leo hoped.)

* * *

Three days after nearly getting killed while collecting Hester, Ten decides on a name. Raúl. It suits him. (Raúl has always called Leo “León”, but the first time Leo heard it he near _melted_.)

* * *

The second reason, which hits him on a sleepy morning, sitting at the counter making coffee while Max helps Raúl go over idioms, dawn turning everything a dusty pink-gold-butter-yellow: Raúl is _attractive_ , and distractingly so. Leo decides to Not Think About This, ever. That decision crumples and dies in the first five minutes. God fucking _damn_ _it_.

He calls Mattie to have a one-sided argument about it, sick with fear and half-convinced that this attraction is _wrong_ somehow. She is nice enough not to laugh at him. She is vicious enough to tell him his dad was a homophobic prick. Leo figures that's probably where he gets this “internalized homophobia” from. He writes it down, next to “bisexual? (self)” because he's honest enough to realize he needs to remember that too. Just in case... _whatever_ happened to him, happens again.

* * *

Leo doesn't actually need glasses, his eyes are just Weird and see extra colours and layers to normal colours. (He does need reading glasses, technically, but he just squints and shifts a little closer to whatever he's trying to read. He's stubborn like that.)

* * *

Max realizes the strangest bit of routine that's been disrupted after Hobb. Leo hasn't so much as _looked_ at a string of code since. He immediately goes to tell Mia about it, which gives Hester the window she was looking for.

* * *

Leo wants to talk to Raúl about how he feels, but what comes out instead is “I fucked up, I think.” Great. Because this is _exactly_ the conversation he wanted to have right now. Thank you, shit brain.

“What's wrong, León?”

“I, um. I had sex with Hester?”

Raúl looks confused. “What's wrong?”

“I just, I, well, I didn't _want_ to, not really, but then, well, she said she wanted to know what it felt like, y'know, and I wanted... to help, I guess? Dunno.”

The confusion intensifies. “Did she ask? If you wanted?”

“Well, no. But I didn't, y'know, _say_ no, or anything.”

Raúl shakes his head, grimacing, “esto es _muy_ malo, León.”

“Thanks, mate.”

And then Hester is in his face and shouting and _oh fuck she has a knife_? The fight doesn't last very long, but Leo does manage to get stabbed in the chest just under his collarbone, so. Fun times. The fight doesn't last long because Raúl tackles Hester and puts his fist through her chest.

* * *

Leo looks at Raúl after, synth blue and organic red mixing on two pairs of hands pressed to the wound on Leo's chest, and the third reason hits him all at once.

Oh.

_Oh!_

_Oh, **shit**!_

The third reason: Leo is hopelessly in love with Raúl.

* * *

Which is... not ideal, considering he's also in love with Mattie. This is going to be _so_ much _fun_ to try to explain. 


	3. He ain't heavy, he's my brother

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> playing with the uncanny valley-ness of cyborg things  
> tw for dissociation/losing time and depiction of a seizure

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> went back and edited chapter two because I realized I accidentally said that Fred was already there, which obviously doesn't work with the plot of this chapter lol  
> also apologies that this is so short

He wakes up and doesn't know where he is. His head _hurts_. His chin jerks, sharply, to the left, without his consent. Yellow light blinks in the corner of his eye, and he looks towards it. Words pop up and scroll across his vision.

**INITIATE SYSTEM RECALL?**

He blinks, and something chimes. _Reboot_ , he thinks, but he doesn't know why he would think that. He's not a computer, is he? Something else chimes, after a minute or two, but it sounds different, and the words are red this time.

**MEMORY BANK CORRUPTED. SYSTEM RECALL: ERROR_02: FILE NOT FOUND.**

Another word pops up, and he's almost dizzy with it. Too many flashing lights. This one is green like the text in old computers.

**TROUBLESHOOT SYSTEM?**

He blinks again, and his vision darkens, filled with a thick blue line that crawls slowly from one side of his peripherals to the other. Another error chime, and the words are red again.

**ERROR FOUND: ERROR_778: UNABLE TO VERIFY IDENTITY OF SERVER.**

**TRY AGAIN?**

He sighs and shakes his head. The lights and words thankfully go away with a funny little _bloop_ noise that reminds him of a film with a robot that looked like a rubbish bin with legs. (What film? When did he see it? The hell is _going_ _on_?) He gets up, convinced that there's something he has to do, and he is, rather abruptly, standing in the back room of a church, the waxed-plastic feel of a tarp in his hands. His feet ache and his head is pounding. He thinks his nose might be bleeding, and there's a painful throbbing under his collarbone. He judders, and tugs the tarp. There's a person under it, and he knows that this must be what he had to do. He crouches and taps the man's chin with twitching fingers. The man blinks open _greengreengreen_ eyes and startles a bit. “Leo,” the man says. “Leo, what are you doing here? I told you to leave me behind.”

He doesn't know who Leo is, and his mouth isn't working right. He slurs something, incoherent noises, his limbs jerking like a marionette's. The man looks alarmed, now. “Leo, what... you're _hurt_!”

“Suh... sys... _tem_... ffffi... meh... ry,” he croaks, head jerking. He wonders, distantly, if his head is throwing sparks. It certainly _feels_ like it. The man scoops a battered mobile out of his own pocket, jamming at the little buttons. He says something, but everything sounds tinny and distorted and frustratingly out of reach. The person who might be Leo grabs at the man's wrist with a spasming hand, something filtering into his slipshod memory at the touch. He grins, lopsided, “ffff... Fuh-red. You. Fred.”

The man-who-is-possibly-Fred hitches a smile on his face and hauls him close, and Might Be Leo tucks his chin into Fred's shoulder. Fred rubs his hand down Might Be Leo's back, murmuring softly, “it's alright, Leo. It's gonna be alright, little brother. I've got you. You're gonna be alright. The others are gonna be here soon. We'll figure it out, yeah?” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yes the "rubbish bin with legs" is R2D2 lol


End file.
